The $4.99 is not bad for Xcode and all the documentation. I just wonder how many Apple expect to sell!

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Originally Posted by Marvin

I hope they aren't offering a subscription outside of an app without also allowing the option to subscribe inside the app, tsk. Bundling emulators too.

I think $100 a year is a lot to ask just to test apps. How do they even come up with that price? If you jailbreak, you can get it for free and it feels so much better knowing you are free to develop for your own hardware without one day Apple stopping your license.

I could understand a fee for publishing to the store or even for support but not just to allow you to do hardware debugging.

If someone can install their own app on devices without jailbreaking then what stops them from selling their own apps outside the app store?! Installing an app on a device for development requires the device UDID to be entered into the Developers Portal, which is for paid developers only. The process also requires security certificates, provisioning profiles.. etc.

How come Apple is now charging (albeit small amount of) money for this. It used to be one of great selling points of Mac and OS X that I used to tell everyone that Macs came with pro development tools bundled with each Mac (as optional install).

Becoming an educated person is way overrated. You can learn all you need to know from Fox news. The louder opinion is always right.

You can learn everything you need from NPR too... Or do what I do, take them all, listen and laugh at their narrow view of the universe. Then seek out as much information as you can, develop your own reasoning skills etc. then you won't need anyone to tell you what to think.

I hope they aren't offering a subscription outside of an app without also allowing the option to subscribe inside the app, tsk. Bundling emulators too.

I think $100 a year is a lot to ask just to test apps. How do they even come up with that price? If you jailbreak, you can get it for free and it feels so much better knowing you are free to develop for your own hardware without one day Apple stopping your license.

I could understand a fee for publishing to the store or even for support but not just to allow you to do hardware debugging.

..so you just want to test and NOT sell them on the store?

can you clarify this " If you jailbreak, you can get it for free and it feels so much better knowing you are free to develop for your own hardware without one day Apple stopping your license"

... get what for free and what do you mean develop for your own hardware?

Any applications you make will run on a jailbroken device. When the provisioning profile for my iPhone ran out a year after my iPhone development class ended, my applications still synced because it was jailbroken.

How come Apple is now charging (albeit small amount of) money for this. It used to be one of great selling points of Mac and OS X that I used to tell everyone that Macs came with pro development tools bundled with each Mac (as optional install).

This seems like a change in policy for the worse?

It's a change in the policy, in a good way.

XCode was never "free". XCode was part of the new OS releases, 2.0 with 10.4, 3.0 with 10.5. So you had to pay 129$ to use the new XCode because it didn't work with previous OS's.

For the first time, Apple is releasing a new XCode, without making it limited to their new OS release 10.7.

And they are charging a small fee for it. So in a way, this one costs 124$ less than the previous ones.

And I bet this will be included with 10.7 for free so the policy to include XCode with the new release will not change.

If you buy the new OS as well, which was never free. XCode 2 released with 10.4, did not work with 10.3. XCode 3 released with 10.5, did not work with 10.4.

XCode 4 released with 10.7, works with 10.6, for a 5$ fee.

So your argument is that Xcode was never free because it typically required the latest version of the OS to run? I don't think it's usual to include the prerequisites for a thing when calculating a price. It was definitely free, and now it's $5 or $99.

To follow your logic, Xcode 4 is quite a bit more heavyweight than Xcode 3. If we include prerequisites, I could argue that Xcode 4 requires a new Mac, therefore Apple just increased the price of their dev tools by thousands.

I hope they aren't offering a subscription outside of an app without also allowing the option to subscribe inside the app, tsk. Bundling emulators too.

I think $100 a year is a lot to ask just to test apps.

If all you are doing is testing apps, developers can build a version with your device's IMEI number that you can install using the iPhone Configuration Utility for you to test with. You don't need an iOS Dev membership at all.

This. If you're learning something you can get done with just a computer then the only real skill you need to develop is Googlefoo.

This explains all the poorly designed, buggy, and bloated software out there. People think they can read a book or two, google a little bit, and all of a sudden know about algorithm and data structure design, memory management, and UI design.

So your argument is that Xcode was never free because it typically required the latest version of the OS to run? I don't think it's usual to include the prerequisites for a thing when calculating a price. It was definitely free, and now it's $5 or $99.

To follow your logic, Xcode 4 is quite a bit more heavyweight than Xcode 3. If we include prerequisites, I could argue that Xcode 4 requires a new Mac, therefore Apple just increased the price of their dev tools by thousands.

You are not making any sense. XCode 4 does not require a new mac.

This is the first time an XCode upgrade is being released without an accompanying OS upgrade.

This is why people are confused. And this is why there's a fee.

XCode 4 will be free for Lion users, most likely.

So if Apple waited 3 months to release XCode 4, and released it together with Lion, like they did before, and didn't offer it for 10.6 users at all, nobody would be complaining. But they would be missing out on a new XCode for a 5$ fee.

This is Apple being generous. Not greedy.

If Apple charges 5$ for Lion users, then you can complain. Because you only need XCode 4 if you are going to develop for Lion. 3.2 is enough for every platform Apple is supporting right now, and it is free.

Mate I hope you're having a laugh, because if not you really shouldn't twist your mind like that, no matter how much of a fan you are of something. You sound like a Christian trying to explain away all the evidence that the Earth is older than 5,000 years.

Mate I hope you're having a laugh, because if not you really shouldn't twist your mind like that, no matter how much of a fan you are of something. You sound like a Christian trying to explain away all the evidence that the Earth is older than 5,000 years.

Have you read what I wrote? Or did you just read that one line?

This is the first time someone can say "I don't want to pay 129$ to upgrade to new OS, I only want to upgrade my XCode. How much is it? 5$? Ok."

Before this, if you wanted new XCode, you had to pay 129$ because before this new XCodes did not work with old OS's.

XCode 2 was released with 10.4 and did not work with 10.3.

XCode 3 was released with 10.5 and did not work with 10.4.

XCode 4 is being released, with 10.7 basically but it works with 10.6 as well, again, for the first time. But for a 5$ fee.

I read what you wrote, and it was so mental, I had to wash my synapses out with soap and water. If you have to redefine the usual meaning of "price" in order to defend an action of Apple's, it should be a hint to you that you're skating on thin ice (psychologically as well as factually).

I read what you wrote, and it was so mental, I had to wash my synapses out with soap and water. If you have to redefine the usual meaning of "price" in order to defend an action of Apple's, it should be a hint to you that you're skating on thin ice (psychologically as well as factually).

Yes I did understand it, I just think your interpretation of events in wrong. This is not Apple being magnanimous and giving us the 10.7 dev tools early for a small fee, it's them severing the OS X and Xcode release cycles, due to Xcode being as much (more?) about iOS now as OS X. And they are using the App Store to do it.

Yes I did understand it, I just think your interpretation of events in wrong. This is not Apple being magnanimous and giving us the 10.7 dev tools early for a small fee, it's them severing the OS X and Xcode release cycles, due to Xcode being as much (more?) about iOS now as OS X. And they are using the App Store to do it.

They are not severing the cycles.

Lion works with XCode 4.1, not with XCode 4.0. And Lion will most probably include XCode 4.1 for free anyway. So the new OS will come with the required XCode, as before.

People are freaking out like they "have to" pay 5$ to keep doing what they have been doing yesterday.

It's a sign of the times. When Mac OS X 10.0 shipped Apple gave away all dev tools to encourage anyone to write for Apple's platforms. Now they don't need to, people will pay them to write for their platforms.

....

Until Xcode 4 and long before MacOS X 10.0, Apple's developer tools were free. It is disappointing that Apple now sees fit to charge for Xcode. I do take some solace in the fact that Xcode costs less than breakfast.

Objective-C is more or less just C with a smalltalk like interface for OOP. You NEED to understand how to program in C before you can learn Objective-C. That said, Apple has decent documentation on their Objective-C environment.

You do need to understand C and even have passing knowledge of C++ depending upon what you may end updoing on one of Apples OS'es. But do get C under your belt first. Well maybe concurrently as you learn Objective C which is really a thin layer above C.

Beyond that you really need to know object oriented programming concepts and especially MVC (model view controller). Depending upon you experience C is fairly easy to learn, what takes awhile is learning the API/SDK. It might be beneficial to look for training related to the SDK instead as the learning curve is larger.

No, it has nothing to do with hardware. It has to do with software and drivers. Which is exactly what I said. As for the percentage, I didn't make any claims about it being the majority, either. As for your "failed dev" comment, that's just idiotic. Is your blood sugar low?

I have to say that it is more than a failure it is just plain foolish. A developer that can't keep up or doesn't want to soon becomes useless.

Quote:

Thanks for posting. It's always amusing to be reminded that *anyone* can get on the Internet these days.

Until Xcode 4 and long before MacOS X 10.0, Apple's developer tools were free. It is disappointing that Apple now sees fit to charge for Xcode. I do take some solace in the fact that Xcode costs less than breakfast.

First $5.00 is nothing. Especially considering what you have access to. Think about it, do you really believe Apple will make money on XCode at $5.00 a head? It is highly doubtful especially considering how many tools projects they are supporting right now.

Second it is a given that new software will require advance hardware support, that is why developers should avoid bargain basement hardware. It has been the case since the first ZpC hit the market, you either wait or throw more hardware at your tools. People should be happy that Apple has refactored XCode because frankly the old version was buggy as hell.

So really if you want to complain take the new XCode, find the bugs and report them to Apple. If $5.00 is to much for you skip a couple of beers this week.